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Stay tuned to this first post for updates, news, and gameplay tips

Hi fellow SimCity fans, this thread is organize a region for us to work on and for city planning discussion. Tonight I will update this first post with how to get to our region after it is created and accept friend requests to start sending invites

Just a tip for traffic management I've learned- Placing railroad spots in the road give cars a place to turn around in the middle of a street. Helps alot with managing bus traffic which like to do u-turns all the time.

I also have about half of my city using public transportation, really cuts down on traffic. Managing where you build stops and setting up two park and rides and a municple bus depot near your highway entrance is a good plan. With all the bus traffic near the entrance, using the railroad tracks as cheater turn around points works wonders. After you place the railroad piece, bulldoze the tip of track the sticks into you plot

There is a lot of micromanaging you have to do and really pay attention to your routes. Also try to simplify your street car layout. Mine is basically a loop around my city. The municipal bus depots allow you to use 80 person buses. The city right now I'm working has been specifically aimed at traffic management, I'm at around 102k and slowly working to increase population and keep things manageable.

Another tip I have is to place commercial zones combined with your residential. A lot of traffic can be lessened when your sims don't need to drive across town to go shopping.

It's pretty crazy right now, My city has virtually no traffic at the 100k point, so I think I'm set to start pushing forward with more. Trust me I know the frustration, my first city is at 200k is basically dead in the water because of traffic issues. I believe there are real bugs that need to be fixed though. Street cars can go full ****** and just go between two stations and never traverse the system.

I was able to cut my wait times at street car stops just by trying different locations for stops. At one point I found the perfect spots and dropped wait times 75% and increased rider usage by 60%.

Last edited by thepittman on Tue Mar 12, 2013 11:06 pm, edited 15 times in total.

PensFanInDC wrote:I haven't even looked at a sim city game since the 90s. Those screen shots are blowing my mind...

This. I had SimCity 2000 come with my first Windows computer...took me a while to figure it out actually (first several times I didn't realize that zoning was crucial to the game...I'd sit there and wonder why there were no people!), never really got good at it either I don't think...

PensFanInDC wrote:I haven't even looked at a sim city game since the 90s. Those screen shots are blowing my mind...

This. I had SimCity 2000 come with my first Windows computer...took me a while to figure it out actually (first several times I didn't realize that zoning was crucial to the game...I'd sit there and wonder why there were no people!), never really got good at it either I don't think...

probably because you reside in new jersey. its very understandable that someone from the jerz fails to understand the basics of urban planning and desirable lifestyles

Build it like CenturyLink Field so it most efficiently bounces sound back down to the field, remove railings from the bottom of the upper bowl, and make the rows as steep as possible so the leaning does not disturb the fans in the rows behind.

relantel wrote:My 8yo daughter has been hooked on SC3000 for years. Of course, she loves Civilization3 too, a similar vintage game, 2001-2002 or so.

Wat? When I was 8 the only thing I could do in Sim City was cause disasters. Heck, in Civilization the only thing I could do was submit to the computer. Nothing has changed. I think your daughter may be significantly more intelligent than me.

Sam's Drunk Dog wrote:Anyone willing to give a review of the game? What landscaping tools are available if any? Is the city size as restricting as I've read? Any other downsides?

There aren't any terraforming tools yet. My guess is that there will be YEARS of DLC content for SimCity, as there are already foreign city packs and a hero and villains DLC at launch.

City sizes are fairly small, but you can claim neighboring cities in your region to continue building a co-operative city. As Tangradiville ran out of space for a garbage dump, I claimed a neighboring city, gifted it some simeleons (money in SimCity), and built a large dump with extra garbage trucks to service my main city. It will essentially serve as a dump for profitable city. There are dozens, if not hundreds of ways to work co-operatively between cities. Schools, police, healthcare, education, and so on can be shared/traded between cities. Very cool, and a very deep level of play.

The downside, I guess, is that you must have an Internet connection to play even single player. Maxis claims to have wanted this, but I'm sure their overlords at EA wanted this to combat piracy and to pipe in DLC content. I don't find it an issue for me, at least yet. I think this is a sign o' the times. Eventually, all games will have this.

Having not played a SimCity game since SimCity 2000 (which came out in 1994!), some are complaining about the traffic AI. Like cars and buses don't move out of the way of emergency vehicles, congestion, and buses running back to back. I don't notice that stuff at all, but the SC4 people are up in arms about it.

SimCity has also been patched locally about 3-4 times already, and it hasn't been out a week yet. There have also been a number of server patches, too. This is a great change from my other recent gaming experience - Battlefield 3, which patches only shortly before a DLC release in order to save money. Sony and Microsoft charge a fee to host game patches, so EA/DICE sneak patches out with new DLC packs to cut expenses. So, in 15 months we've had 4 patches, often waiting months to fix obvious, glaring glitches like a certain weapon attachment doing 300% damage with one shot. It's nice not worrying about pleasing the console makers.

As mentioned in the video game thread, anyone who orders SimCity through the 18th will receive a free game through EA/Origin.

Sam's Drunk Dog wrote:Anyone willing to give a review of the game? What landscaping tools are available if any? Is the city size as restricting as I've read? Any other downsides?

There aren't any terraforming tools yet. My guess is that there will be YEARS of DLC content for SimCity, as there are already foreign city packs and a hero and villains DLC at launch.

City sizes are fairly small, but you can claim neighboring cities in your region to continue building a co-operative city. As Tangradiville ran out of space for a garbage dump, I claimed a neighboring city, gifted it some simeleons (money in SimCity), and built a large dump with extra garbage trucks to service my main city. It will essentially serve as a dump for profitable city. There are dozens, if not hundreds of ways to work co-operatively between cities. Schools, police, healthcare, education, and so on can be shared/traded between cities. Very cool, and a very deep level of play.

The downside, I guess, is that you must have an Internet connection to play even single player. Maxis claims to have wanted this, but I'm sure their overlords at EA wanted this to combat piracy and to pipe in DLC content. I don't find it an issue for me, at least yet. I think this is a sign o' the times. Eventually, all games will have this.

Having not played a SimCity game since SimCity 2000 (which came out in 1994!), some are complaining about the traffic AI. Like cars and buses don't move out of the way of emergency vehicles, congestion, and buses running back to back. I don't notice that stuff at all, but the SC4 people are up in arms about it.

SimCity has also been patched locally about 3-4 times already, and it hasn't been out a week yet. There have also been a number of server patches, too. This is a great change from my other recent gaming experience - Battlefield 3, which patches only shortly before a DLC release in order to save money. Sony and Microsoft charge a fee to host game patches, so EA/DICE sneak patches out with new DLC packs to cut expenses. So, in 15 months we've had 4 patches, often waiting months to fix obvious, glaring glitches like a certain weapon attachment doing 300% damage with one shot. It's nice not worrying about pleasing the console makers.

As mentioned in the video game thread, anyone who orders SimCity through the 18th will receive a free game through EA/Origin.

When you say you "claimed" a neighboring city, does that mean you gained complete control over it and could do what you wanted there?

PensFanInDC wrote:I haven't even looked at a sim city game since the 90s. Those screen shots are blowing my mind...

This. I had SimCity 2000 come with my first Windows computer...took me a while to figure it out actually (first several times I didn't realize that zoning was crucial to the game...I'd sit there and wonder why there were no people!), never really got good at it either I don't think...

6X6 lots surrounded by road. Grid system. Put a police station in the midst of any big industrial zones. Dense zoning only. Profit. Oh and if you have mountains on the generated map don't hesitate to put water and hydro power on them. Having enough hydro power that you don't have worry about a power plant blowing up is a good feeling.